Braunstone Gate Drawings - New Acquisitions

Both images © Christopher Booth (b. 1962), donated by the artist in 1983.

 

These two artworks were recently transferred to Leicester Museums and Galleries from Leicestershire County Museums Service, which had had them since their donation by the artist in 1983. They are both by Christopher Booth, born 1962, a signalman based at Coalville at the time of making.

The works depict the Braunstone Gate railway bridge and have come to the city collection due to their subject matter. They are amazingly detailed pencil drawings based on historic photographs in the Newton Collection, which is held at the Records Office for Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland and records the building of the Great Central Railway in the 1890s.

In both drawings, the workers (or ‘navvies’) are shown, though in one they are seen at more of a distance hard at work, whilst in the other they are in much closer detail, pausing briefly for the photographer.

View the photographs on which these drawings are based on the Railway Archive, showing the one from a distance here and the close-up of the navvies here.

Both artworks can be seen this autumn at Leicester Museum & Art Gallery.